Hello my Literary Friends!

This morning we were up at 6.45am for an 8am departure as today we are off to Essouira (pron. Ess-oui-ra (French) or Ess-oo-wear-ah). Surprisingly enough, the skies were grey and we copped a very heavy shower while taking our bags across to the lobby! Once again we took advantage of the made-to-order omelette and pancakes, this morning pancakes were more like giant crumpets with a slight yeast flavour from the raising agents. On the way to Essouira we had a morning in Marrakech and picked up a local guide for a local city tour, Abdul, before stopping by the Bahia Palace where we learned decorations are used to fill time not space. Text in decorations gives people something to read whereas images don’t occupy people as long and image-based decorations are more western. From my understanding this is because in their religion and culture, the idea is not to try and replicate anything ‘made by god’ because it is already perfect. So this is why symbols and text are used and not images of pre-existing things like people, flowers, deities etc.

In the little school room inside the palace we learned about education. Six sided star is  the symbol of knowledge based on the senses. The sink in the centre of the room is used to wash the school supplies (writing boards) and stones. This would include covering the slate with clay mud to help the student carve letters into the clay to learn writing. They could then wash the clay from the slate and start again. 

 We walked to the market square again for a quick coffee before jumping on the bus up the street to the Menara gardens. Marrakech is known as a garden city due to the high percentage of garden spaces with 12 main gardens.

Our final stop before heading to Essouira, was the Bakhar mirror pool. The wind was up today and the sky was cloudy with impending rain, so sadly the pool wasn’t glassy or flat but it was fun to watch the planes at the nearby airport fly in over the vista.

Bakhar mirror pool on the first stop toward the beach city/windy/fishing of Essouira. After driving for a few hours we stopped in at Cafe Atlas on the road. Like most roadhouses that sell a wide variety of foods, we had low expectations! After eating a tagine for lunch and dinner yesterday, I ended up picking something I thought would be safe in a chicken burger. It was not great and served cold but it was roadhouse food so I suppose you can’t complain too much when there aren’t many options. 

We then drove to the spot to see the goats in the argan trees, which was hilarious. There is no doubt that some local farmer herds the goats up the tree simply for tourist attractions, despite our guide’s protests to the contrary. The story goes that the goats climb the argan trees to eat the nuts, however the goats we saw were standing in bare patches on top of little ‘stands’, so, call me a cynic, but I strongly believe the goats were herded up there and didn’t walk up there of their own accord. This was only reinforced by the fact that there were suspiciously few goats in other argan trees as we drove through. The next stop was the Women’s cooperative argan oil store and display, where we learned about the process for creating cosmetics and consumables from Argan oil. We were told the reason no goats were in their trees was because they keep them fenced out because the nuts used for the oil are ruined when digested by the goats.

Afterward we caught the bus on to Essouira. Pron: essu-‘oui’-ra (French and Arabic). Essu-wear-ah.

The hotel in town is across the street from the beach and easy walking distance to the market. We had to laugh, our room was practically in the carpark and the power didn’t work when we first arrived! It was quickly resolved by the hotel staff and after a 45minute break of quiet time we met for the walking tour and the dinner. We made our way down to the harbour to watch what we could of the sunset through the clouds, and take photos of the blue boats by the dock. One point people made here was that we arrived a bit late for sunset and by the time we made it to the dock it was dark. The fact that it had been raining doesn’t help matters which was hardly our guide’s fault.

We then walked back to the markets to the restaurant. The Il Mare was beautifully located and pretty inside however we had a table immediately in front of the musicians who were very loud and the food was extremely expensive. Now, I’m a self confessed nana, so the 8pm dinner start times were always going to be a struggle for me, but paired with the continuous clanging of cymbals and drum beating, as well as the astronomical prices for food, it was all a bit much for me. The food prices were steep, and not just by Moroccan standards, by Australian standards too (min. 105dur-280dur). I was unable to dissuade anyone near me to find somewhere else to eat and sadly Morocco is not somewhere I’d like to wander alone without a phone (as I didn’t have a simcard that worked) so I ordered a vegetarian stir fry for 105MAD or approximately $15 AUD. My stirfry was edible but most others ordered seafood dishes which for the 200+MAD price tag were, in my opinion, pretty sub-par. I left the dinner early and walked back to the hotel with an Australian couple who had managed to sneak away and find their own three course dinner with wine in an alleyway nearby for $30AUD for the both of them. Suffice to say I was extremely jealous that I didn’t see them slip away from the main restaurant! The food wasn’t great, and go ahead, call me a killjoy, neither was the music.  

Our room had no electricity and the toilet didn’t flush but we got the electricity fixed and upon discussion with others, learned that the plumbing was an issue in all the rooms. And we had a few baby cockroaches on the floor but in Morocco that’s probably to be expected to be honest. The hotel had a lovely central pool however and had the weather been nice I’m sure some people would have taken a dip.

All in all, from a food perspective the day was a tad disappointing, but I had a chance to get to know a few other members of our group and had a good day.

Tips: Carry snacks in your bag today, it is a loooong way between breakfast and lunch! And food options on the road are limited.

Accommodation: Hotel Des Iles, Essouira